On battery powered devices such as mobile phones, using device positioning resources such as Global Positioning System (“GPS”), Assisted GPS (“AGPS”), and Advanced Forward Link Trilateration (“AFLT”) can be a significant drain on the battery. In order to provide a location stream for such a device there are limited numbers of location determinations, referred to in the art as “locates”, which can be performed before the device battery is drained. In practice this number is fairly low, with current technologies typically permitting 50-100 locates per battery charge, depending on the technology used. Moreover, generating or retrieving location information may use valuable bandwidth, processing and memory resources which are needed for other functions of a mobile device. A telecommunication service provider's network infrastructure may also be burdened by use of bandwidth, processing and memory resources as a result of location operations, especially in the case of network-based location operations.
The state of the art approach of locating a mobile device is to attain a mobile device location at a constant rate. This approach however will frequently require an undesirably long interval between location determinations to conserve power and other system resources, resulting in an undesirable level of latency, especially when the device is in motion and frequent location updates are necessary. Increasing the constant rate at which mobile device locations are attained typically results in quick draining of the device battery and overuse of system resources. It would be desirable to attain location from a mobile device in a manner which minimizes device power consumption and consumption of other system resources without causing undesirable level of latency for applications using such location.